


I 11 



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SPEECH 

or 

HON. J. COLLAMEE, OF VERMONT, 

ON 

SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORIES. 






DELIVERED IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED 8TATE9, MAECH 8, 1S60. 



The Senate having resumed the consideralion of the follo-wiug resolutions, sub- 
nutted by Mr. Beo-w'n on the 18th cf January: 

Revived, That the Territories are the eommon property of all the States, and that it is the privi« 
i(>ge of the citizens of all the States to go into the Territories with every kind or description o! pro- 
p^r^y recognised by the Constitution of the United States and held under the laws of any of the 
Slates, and that it is the constitutional duty of the law-nisking power, wherever lodged, and by 
whomsoever exercised, whether by the Congress or the Territorial Legislature, to enact such laws 
as may be found necessary for the adequate and sufBcient protection of such property. 

Besolred, That the Committee on Territories be instructed to insert, in any bill they may report 
for the organization of new Territories, a clause declaring it to be the duty of the Territorial Legis- 
lature to enact adequate and sufficient laws for the protection of all kinds of property, as above de» 
scribed, witliin the limits of the Territory, and that, upon its failure or refusal to do so, it is the ad- 
mitted duty of Congress to interpose and pass such laws. 

The question is on the amendment of Mr. "Wilkixsox, to strike out all after the 
word " resolved," where it first occurs, and insert the following : 

That the Territories are the common property of ihe peofile of the United States ; that Congress 
has full power and authority to pass all laws necessary and proper for the government of such Ter- 
ritories; and tliat, in the exercise of such power, it is the <luty of Congress so to legislate in relation 
to slavery therein that the interests of free labor may be encouraged" and protected in such Terri^ 
lories. 

lieioVoed, That the Committee on Territories be instructed to insert in any bill they may report 
for the organization of new Territories a clause declaring that there shall be neither slavery nor in- 
voluntary servitude in such Territories, except in punishment for crime whereof the party has been 
duly convicted. 

Mr. COLLAMER. Mr. President^ the resolutions under consideration relate to 
the condition of slavery in the Territories, and propose to provide legislation in re- 
lation to that subject^ especially legislation to protect and preserve it there. The 
discussion on this subject, as it was begun and has gone on in the Senate during the 
progress of this session, has taken a very wide range. I have no fault to find with 
that; but it seems to me, after all, that we might bring ourselves a little nearer to 
some practical application of principles. When we consider the condition of our 
eountiy — I mean of our whole country — the condition of society which exists in it, 
and the adaptation of our measures to tbat condition of society, we may bring oar- 
selves to the practical application of some important principles. 

E'ow, what is the state of society here? Take oitr nation, for which we legislate, 
the whole of which is a proper suijjeet of our consideration, the whole of which is 
to be considered in measuring out our different degrees of policy, and the m'^asurea 
calctiiftted to advance its interests. No legislation can be valuable, unleso upon 
the whole it is an advantage to the country for which it is made, and we must con- 
sider the actual condition of that country at the time, in erder to see the praetical 
application of the measures we are about to pursue. 

We have, it seems, Mr. President, two conditions of society existing in this coun- 
try — that existing in the slaveholding States and tliat existing in the iion-slarehold- 
ing States, which I, for brevity, shall call, as they are i:snally called, the free States. 
Tlie condition of society in the free States, which include, in round numbers, about 

— • '- . li^. 

Printed by Lemuel Towers, at $1 50 per hundred copies. 



£438 



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two-tliirJs of the inhabi4ant.s of this conntiy, is based on this idea, that all men are 
to be eJiicated; that there is to be universal suffrage ; that men are to be educated 
with a view to discharge this duty and privilege of suffrage. "SVlien our fathers aC 
the East entered npon this experiment at first in New England, all the notions- 
which Jiad existed for ages in other regions of the world, in relation to landlord and 
tenant, lord and vassal, pati-ician ami plebian, master and slave, were entirely to be 
obliterated, and all the notions which had i)revailed, too, of primogeniture and of 
entail, and everything that was calculated to perpetuate those distinctions in society,, 
were to be done av/ay with. In short, they proposed, anil the idea they entertained 
was, to enter upon an experiment of a free and eqnal system of republican govern- 
ment; that every man should own the land he cultivates, and eveiy man should 
cultivate the land he owns; that there should be none to rule and Done to serve; 
that every man should serve himself, and then he of course would have a faithful 
servant. 

That sj-stcTD is not merely ideal. It practically prevails through the large body 
of the free States — ^not so much in the cities, not so entirely in the more densely 
populated regions; but such is the actual condition of the landholding part of the 
people of the free States. I will not spend tinie to elaborate this system any more. 
I do not propose now, or at any other time in the course of my remarks, to say any- 
thing to commend it particularly to the acceptance of any one. I simply wish to 
state it, and briefly to describe it, and there rest in relation to that. 

The other condition of society, existing in the slaveholding States of this Union, I 
would rather cite as described by another, than undertake to do it mj'self. Mr. 
Calhoun, in 1837, .eaid: 

" Sfany in the South once believed that it (slavery) waa a moral and political evil ; that folly and 
delusion are gone. "We see it now in its true light," and regard it as a most safe and stable basis for 
free institutions in the "ivorld. * * * The southern States are an aggregate, in fact, of communi- 
ties, not of individuals. Every plantation is a little community, with "the^master at its head, who 
conccntratea in himself the uuited interests of capital and labor, of which he is the common repre- 
sentative. The small communities aggregated make the State, ia all whose action, labor and capi- 
tal are equally represented and perfectly harmonized." 

I am not about to make anj^ remarks in relation to the question of whether this 
is a desirable or undesirable condition. I simph- desire briefly to elaborate a little 
wliat Mr. Calhoun here says of it. From these remarks, two things are quite ob- 
vious. In the first place, it is obvious that is an aristocracy. He says that these 
communities, of which the master or owner is the head, aggregated, make the State,, 
and the owner is the representative of these separate communities. That meets my 
idea of nothing more nor less than an aristocracy. I do not say that this condition 
of things is censurable. I do not use the word " aristocracy " in any bad sense. 
I say it is simply that. Another thing, which is perhaps but an ingredient of the 
first, is, that the mass of the community — I do not speak now of the slaves — are,, 
in efi'ect, practically ignored. The masters representing, as Mr. Calhoun says, these 
separate communities, make the State, and, as the representatives of the labor and 
property of which they are masters and owners, they of course guide the State, and 
hence,_ he says, there comes to be no collision. We all ,i;pderstaud that a large 
majority of the southern people are not slaveholders, and they nsij'er will be proba- 
bly. Of course, according to his own statement, they are essentially left out of the 
account. 

These two conditions of society, inasmuch as they are both in existence in our 
country, and no doubt will be during our lives, and probably for centuries to come, 
present to us a problem to solve ; and the question is, what is our duty here, for 
this body is the representative of these two interests. 1 regard it as the duty of 
Congress, eo far as the powers which liave been delegated to it will enable it to do, 
to endeavor to promote and advance the prosperity of all parts of this country ; of 
both these sections, if you call them sections; of' both these conditions of society. 
That may be a very difficult problem ; but the more difticult it is, the more we 
should be willing to grasp it, meet it, do our duty in relation to it. I think we are 
not at liberty to set aside any one part of our country, or any one of these condi- 
tions of society, on the ground that we cannot exactly reconcile its privileges, its 
interests, its duties, with those of the other. That problem is put into our hands in 
the formation of our Uovernment, in the existence of this Government, and wo can- 
not do our duty if we avoid it. 

It is, I say, Mr. President, not an easy task to shape the policy of this Govern- 
ment, to order the forms of our commercial intercourse, to lay our duties and taxes., 
to frame all our laws in such a m.anner as shall best promote the advantage of the 
whole of this people, and both of theise classes, and this whole community, It Biay be 



true, at times, that wc shall find the interests of one part condiftin? in sonie degree 
^vith the interests of another part, and therefore it is that the problem Tiiay be diffi- 
cult of solution, practically in our hands; but it is nevertheless the problem put into 
our hands. It is to that we must address ourselves. It is that we must perform as 
far as we can, and as much as in us lies. 

The first thing that occurs to my mind is this question : is it at all probable that 
we can, either of us, induce the other to adopt our system of society? Argue it as 
long as Ave please, spend as much of our time and breath about it as we may, in 
commendation of the respective system which we represent, and to whicli we 
belong, afier all, I believe there is very little reason to suppose that in this llall one 
party will be able to induce the other to adopt its system. It is not very likely, it 
is not very probable. Whenever the system of either party is attacked, and its 
weaknesses attempted to be exposed, eacii may stand on the defensive, and that is 
well enough, if so be that it is conduci ed in appropriate spirit, and witli that courtesy 
and urbanity which should become the places that we occupy in this, which ought 
to be regarded as an august body. 

It will hardly do to say that tiiese two conditions of society cannot exist in the 
same nation. There is a coexistence in the same nation. There is another kind oi 
coexistence in the sami^ hiunicipal government. They are not the same thing.^ I 
fancy tliar, after an experiment of eighty years or more, we may at least say tiiat 
they can exist, and prosperously, too, in the same nation. The lesson of our own 
experience teaches as much as that these two conditions can exist, and exist prosper- 
ously, in the same nation. But when we say that, we should recollect that the 
word •' nation," as applied to a people like ours, is a term composed of an aggregate 
of separate nations, in one sense separate sovereignties; and all the internal and 
municipal regulations to v/hich the condition of society belongs, fall approi)riately 
and exclusively within the jurisdiction of the local authorities of the Sovereign 
States. 

Then there mav be a well-shaped and well-conducted and prosperously-conducted 
nation, with one condition of society, in one ?tate, in one municipality, and another 
in another State. They may both be prosperous within the same nation ; but, after 
all, the_y cannot coexist in the same municipal government. That is a mere trui.sm, 
perhaps. It requires one sinsply to state it to apprehend it. I say a Slate cannot 
be 'a non-slaveholding State and a slaveholding State at the same time; and I may 
say, I may add withequal truth, that I think our experience shows us that, under 
a territorial government, a Territory cannot be at the same time a slaveholding and 
a free Territory. I believe that experiment has been attempted, and it is a failure ; 
the thing cannot be. It would seem to be very obvious on the mere statement. It 
would involve a paradox. 

Well, now, sir, what shall we do with this country, having these two conditions 
•of society spread over it and existing in it? What is our duty in relation to the 
matter? We have no quarrel or difficulty in relation to slavery, so far as it exists 
within the separate States- Jt exists under the operation and protection of the gov- 
ernments of those separate States, peaceably and quietly. But the question arise."!, 
what shall we do in relation to it when we come to the territory^ which lies out of 
and beyond the jurisdiction of the several States? We must keep the peace about 
it; it must be arranged in some waj'. What can we do with it? How can we get 
alang with it, quietly and peaceably? I think we, like anj' other people, might be 
enabled, if we were so inclined, to draw some lessons of advantage from our own 
experience, arid from the history of our own country. We are apt to fcMget, in the 
hurry of new and imtried experiments, that after all, experience is the safest guide 
for to-day and the safest guide for truth. We speak of our fathers — they who 
established this Oovernment. How did they manage it? Is it not well enough for 
us occasionally to look at the old vv-ay, and ascertain how it was? The further we 
.get into difficult}-, the more troubles we experience in trying new modes and new 
experiments, the more we ought to be inclined to see how this matter was managed 
originally, and how that management succeeded. IJow was it? I think nothing 
can be more <'le.<ir, on a candid examination, than that they looked upon slavery as 
a great evil. So admits Mr. Calhoun himself; undoubtedly it was true. No man 
disputes that now. How did tliey projiose to manage it? It was in this way: the 
old Congress of the Confederation was sitting at the time the convention was sitting 
in Philadelphia. In that Confederation Congress they acted in relation to the then 
known atid tiien owned territory of the United States, lying out of and beyond the 
limits of the separate States; and, in providing a Government for it, enacted that 
slavery or involuntary servitude, except for crime, should not there exist; it was. 



entirely forbidden. That provision -was. Landed over and duly liotiiied to the eoa-' 
vention that v>'a3 sitting to form the Constitution ; sitting eoteniporaiieously. They 
understood tliat, and it was in no way disapproved by them. They provided in the 
Constitution that Congress should have power "to make all needful rules and regu- 
lations" for the disposition of the territory and other property of the United States-, 
thus bestowing on the new proposed Government the power of control over tha 
Territories, and they immediately exercised it in the First Congress, by legitimating 
and adapting the provisions of the ordinauce of 1787 to the then existing form of 
government. 

There was another thing. They did not looJi upon slavery then as a mere local 
matter — a matter of mere local interest. The nation provided for the Northwest 
Territory; but that was not all. It was then undoubtedly the general prevailing 
opinion that if they cut off the supply of slaves by prohibiting the African slave 
trade, and limited the extent of territory in which slavery should exist, b}- confining 
it to its then existing limits, it would finally die out. There is no doiibt that they 
entered upon that experiment. They vested in Congress the power, after 1808, to 
which time the extreme southern States then desired to continue the trade, to cut 
off that foreign supply — to cut off the African slave trade; and thej' had in the 
ordinance of 1787, the continuance of Avhich the new Co[-''titution contemplated, 
a provision for limiting the extent of territory in which it should prevail. 

1 have been charged over and over — I can remember at least three times, by three 
different gentlemen in the Senate, in the progress of this discussion — -with having 
said, which was true, that I believed the more limited the extent of territory to 
which slavery was confined, tlie sooner it would come to an end. The honorable 
Senator from Alabama, (Mr. Clat,) the honorable Senator from North Carolina, 
(Mr. CuxGMAX,) and, I believe, other gentlemen, have seemed to think that, in ap- 
proving of that sentiment, I am an Abolitionist; and one Senator says that ia 
nothing more nor less than a plan to smoke them out — not a very elegant expression. 
Have 1 entertained any new tho\"ight on that subject ? I desire to c&U attention 
for one moment to a single remark n>ade by the Senator from Virginia at this 
session. Mr. Mason said, on the 23d of January, speaking of those Vi'ho made the 
Constitution : 

" I believe this was their opinioB : their prejudice iras aimed against the foreign slave trade, the 
African slave trade, aud their lielief was, that by cutting that oli, slavery would die out of iWelf, 
without any act of abolition. I attempted at one time to show, by the recorded opinions of Mr. 
Madison, that the famous ordinance of 17S7. so far as it prohibited slavery in the territory northwest 
of the Ohio, was aimed at the African slave trade, and aimed at that alone ; the idea being that if 
they could restrict the area into which slavery could be introduced (rom abroad, they would, to that 
extent, prevent the importation of slaves ; and that, w hen it was altogether prevt-nted, the conditioa 
of slavery would die out of itself; but they were not AbolitloEists, far less within the meaning and 
spirit of the Abolitionist of the present day." 

That is the view I wished to presents, in shorter words. They entertained the 
idea that if the nation would cut off the foreign supply, and would limit the area 
into which slavery was to go, it would die out. I am not now proposing to say 
how far this idea of theirs was correct; but I must say that I have a strong desire 
to play out that play. Let us go on and carry through the experiment on which 
this Government was founded ; because it was under this idea — in the meridian 
blaze of this idea — that our Constitution was framed. It was framed by men who 
entertained this thought, and it was framed for the purpose of carrying it out. 
Hence it was that the power to cut off the foreigTi supply was vested in Congress,, 
and the limitation in the Territories was done in the ord-inance approved by Con- 
gress. 

Mr. President, is there anything new in the idea which now constitutes the lead- 
ing feature of the Republican platform — that is, keeping slavery out of the Territo- 
ries, and keeping the foreign supply still cut off? One would suppose, who had 
come into this body for the last two or three months, that somehow or other this 
sentiment, this principle, this proposed object, was a new and unheard of aggres- 
sion that was utterly unexampled : that there was no precedent for it in the Gov- 
ernment; that it called upon all uien, everywhere, to raise their voices in utter 
execration of the whole of it; and we have been called upon, from day to day, in- 
stead of proposing to carry out this principle, to disband utterly, throw down our 
arms, and disjierse, as the English said to our fathers upon the field of Lexington. 
Sir, there is nothing new in it at all. It was the very framework, it constituted the 
great especial element of the Constitution ; it was one of the great leading purpose* 
of its formation. Gentlemen have wandered so far and so fast from this principle, 
amid the variety of dogmas now set up, one of them being parent to the other-. 



tbey have made so large a departure, that when thej- come to look at the thinsr in 
its modern aspect, men are startled at it, because it does violence to their newly- 
invented dogmas, not because there is anj'thini^ new or strange in it. 

But, Mr. President, we acquired otiier and farther territory than what, was owned 
at the time the Constitution was formed. "We did not at that time, if you please, 
properl}' own that part of the country which now makes Mississippi and Alabama. 
It belonged to Georgia. Our people claimed it — claimed that the title to a large 
part of it, at least, was in the United States, and not in Georgia. Tliat was not 
merely the part ceded by South Carolina. There was another small piece; which 
was, the difference of the line of Florida as n;ade by the British treaty, and as 
practically run. How did the United States arrange the matter when ihe}^ ac- 
quired more territory — that part which they got from K^orth Carolina which makes 
Tennessee, and that part which they obtained fi'om France — the Louisiana j>ui-- 
ehase? IIow did they manage under this same Constitution, in relation to the sub- 
ject of slavery in that country? I had occasion to examine, with some care, this 
very quesiion some time since, and I ])resented it in as brief words as I could in the 
report which I made in 185(5, in relation to the Kansas difficulties. As I said then, 
1 desire to intjuire what our Government did in relation to that, for two ]mrposes : 
in the iirst place, to show what pov/er they expreised, and then the manner of ex- 
ercising it. I think the manner in which they exercised it will clearly show us 
what power they understood themselves to possess ; and not only so, but the man- 
ner in which thej^ executed that powei-, so as to show us clearly their purposes. 

What did they do? I grant to the Senator from Georgia, for I believe he has 
called our attention two or three times this session to the act of 1798, that it is not 
true that Congress always proiiibited slavery in the Territories; not that they had 
not the power to do it, but because of its inexpediency. The true ground on which 
they went, the rule they followed, was this, as the whole lesson of our history will 
show, where slavery was actually existing in the country to any considerable or 
general extent, it was, though somewhat modified in Mississippi and Orleans Terri- 
tories, suffered to remain. The fact that it had been taken there and existed there 
was deemed an indication of its adaptation and local utility. Where slavery did 
not in fact exist to any appreciable extent, it was by Congress expressly prohibited, 
so that in either case, the country settled up without anj^ difficulty or doubt as to 
the character of its institutions. In no instance was this difficult or disturbing 
question left to the people who might settle in the Territories, to be there an ever- 
lasting bone of contention as long as the territorial government existed. It was re- 
garded as a subject in which the whole country had an interest, and therefore im- 
proper for local legislation. 

To illustrate this, I will not go on with the history of governmental action from 
time to time, as Congi-ess made different territorial governments in the country 
northwest of the Ohio. I need not show how tliey continued to repeat over and 
over again the utter prohibition of slavery; but I will call attention to the act 
which has been remarked upon by the Senator from Georgia, in relation to Missis- 
sippi. As to Tennessee, we all know that Xorth Carolina, in making the cession of 
the territory to the United States, prohibited them from doing anything tending to 
tlie abolition of slavery. In relation to Mississippi, I do not understand the action 
of Congress exactly as the gentleman from Georgia presents it. The truth is, that 
the United States claimed a large part of that country, now forming Alabama and 
Mississippi, and Georgia claimed nearly the whole of it. When the Mississippi ter- 
ritorial act was passed, in 1798, it was formed in anticipation of, and it appointed a 
way of fixing commissioners for, the settlement of that dispute with Georgia. The 
territory was settled, as far as it was settled, with slaveholders and slaves. It was 
expected that Georgia, in making her cession, would do as North Carolina had done 
in relation to Tennessee. That territorial act of 1798 remained unexecuted until 
1802. In 1802, the commissioners of Georgia made settlement with the United 
States, and then the United States agi'eed to pay Georgia §1,250,000, for which she 
quit-claimed all her right, claim, and tille, with certain reservations; and, amongst 
other things, she put in a clause forbidding the extension of the anti-slavery clause 
of the ordinance of 1787 over that territory. Thej- made their grant on that con- 
dition. 

What does that show ? The Senator from Georgia says: 

" In 1T9S, when Congress legislated in relation to Mi33i33i])pi Territory, they did not prohibit 
slavery." 

Iso, sir, it was already there; actually established, and it was expected that 
Georgia would insist on keeping it there, and she did insist on keeping it there. 



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But that was not all. The United States' then, in that very act, prohibited the im- 
portation of slaves from abroad, thougli they could not prohibit it in the rest of the 
United States until 1 SOS. By what power did Congress do tliat? Certainly they 
received no power for it fron) the provision of the Constitution that "the migration 
or importation of such persons as any of the States now existing shall think proper 
to admit shall not be prohibited by Congress prior to the year 1808." That did not 
give them any power about it except to prohibit it in all the States after 1808 ;_ but 
they did proceed to prohibit the introduction of slaves into the Mississippi Territory 
in ITOS. Why? Simply for the same reason that they did the rest: they consid- 
ei-ed themselves as possessing the power, in framing territorial governments, to 
frame them in such a way, and with such prohibitions and conditions, as they thought 
would best promote the interests of the nation. They derived the power, no doubt, 
at that time, from that clause of the Constitution called the territorial clause, by 
which they were empowered to make all needful rules and regulations for the Ter- 
I'itorics. None other can be found There cannot bo found a clause in the Consti- 
tution which gave them the power, unless it was that. I know that it is said, with 
regard to Louisiana and other acquisitions obtained by treaty with foreign nations, 
inasmuch as tliej^ have power to acquire, they have the necessarily incidental power 
lo govern; but that cannot apply to Mississippi. It was not acquired by treaty 
from a foreign uation at all. They exercised the power there under the territorial 
clause. 

Again, when our country made the Louisiana purchase from France, in the fii-st 
act forming the territorial government of Orleans Territory, now Louisiana, which 
was in 1803 or 1804, Congress did not prohibit slavery; because it was already 
there, and because it was adapted to the country, I suppose they thought. They 
suffered it, but the}' did not leave it so. They provided that no slaves should go in 
there except in families for settlement; and' in the next place, they provided that 
no slave should be taken in there in any way that had been imported into the Uni- 
ted States after 1798. Why 1798? In 1798 they passed that Mississippi act pro- 
hibiting the importation of slaves from abroad into Mississippi. The}' soon learned 
that it afforded very little security to keep out imported slaves from Mississippi, 
when they could be imported into Georgia and taken over into Mississippi. Con- 
gress, therefore, provided, in the act for Orleans Territory, that no slave should be 
taken in tliere in any way, in families or in any other way, that had been imported 
after 1798. Now, I would ask, did not the people of South Carolina, or Georgia, 
or any other slaveholding State — a-nd a great many of them were such at that 
time — own their slaves whicli they had imported from Africa in 1800, and 1801, and 
1802, and 1803, just as they owned any ot.her slaves they held? If any of them 
were property, were not those slaves property? Clearly they v/ ere. Well, then, 
how did Congress have a right to prohibit their taking them into Louisiana? They 
did exercise the power, and no man doubted it. It remained for fifty years, and no 
man questioned it. 

It is unnecessary, in order to show vv'hat was the power, as then understood b_y 
them, that they should, on all occasions, have prohibited slavery entirely. The fact 
that they did not do that does not show that they had not the pov/er to do it. No, 
Mr. President, a power to regulate is a power to prohibit. Nothing is more fully 
settled, for instance, tlian that the power to regulate commerce is a power to pro- 
kibit commerce altogether, as was fully settled in relation to the embargo. Con- 
gress did regulate this matter in the Territories precisely as they pleased. If the 
cotemporaneous exposition, if the usages and practices, under the Government, by 
those who made it, and, immediately after its formation, continued and pei'sisted in, 
uniform in its operation, can prove anything — and it seems to'me the best possible 
proof, when any doubt exists as to the construction of a paper — then, I say, it is 
clear Congress had and exercised the power, both in the territory they owned at 
the time the Constitution was adopted, and in that which they acquired afterwards, 
either from any of the confederated States, or from a foreigu country. They exer- 
cised this power of regulating, curtailing, or prohibiting, as they in their judgment 
believed to be best for the country. 

Such is the lesson of our experience as to how this matter was originalh' settled. 
In the ]>rogress of affairs, and in thus arranging for the Territories and settling them 
peaceatjl}-, they brought up State after State in perfect peace and success and pros- 
perity until, I "believe, fourteen States had been admitted out of those Territories, 
one-half slave and one half free; they had grown up, under this patronage and this 
administration of the General Government, in the full exercise of this power. In 
the.progress of this history a difficulty was found in relation to the State of Mis- 



Eouri. We liad tlien a Urge tract of Land utterly unsettled ; the settlements in the 
Louisiana purchase had commenced near the mouth of the Mississippi, and gradu- 
ally proceeded up; hut a large part of the Territory -was entirely a wilderness, and 
Congress found themselves in difficulty a? to the question of slavery and freedom 
in tiiat Territory. What did they do? It occurred to the mind at once, "it can- 
not be slaveholding and free territory at the same time.; we cannot have it both at 
once." I cau hardly conceive of any result that would more naturally occur to the 
mind than to divide it. If two men own a field, and one wants to sow it witli oats 
and the other with wheat, and they cannot have oats and wheat together with any 
success, I do not know any other way to get along witli it peaceably but to divide 
the field, and then it may be cultivated with mutual advantage. This is an old 
lesson ; it began very early — I have had occasion befoi-e to call attention to it, and 
will again. "And Abraham said unto Lot, let there be no strife, I pray thee, b*' 
tween'me and thee, and between m.y herdmen and thy herdmc-n, for we be breth- 
ren." "If thou wilt take the left h:iad, then I will go to th« right; or if thou de- 
part to the right hand, then I will go to the left." 

This territory was divided; Missouri was admitted; the line of SG" 30' was run, 
and it was declared that shall be our division. Was there anything wrong in that? 
Was there anything so extravagant and extraordinary in it that we should now go 
to war with our fathers who made peace among themselves by it? Is not theif 
example worthy of imitation ? It certainly is by all those who really desire peace ; 
but if politicians and other men can make themselves capital out of a constant tur- 
moil and trouble, I suppose they will never agree to it. 

Now, Mr. President, what is the proposition of the Republican party? Nothing 
more, nothing less than to restore that line. I do not suppose that those who oblit- 
erated it will render any assistance to again drawing it upon the surface of the 
earth, but that is the proposition, and that is all there is to it ; for if we say that 
slavery shall not go into the Territories, it amounts to that, for there are no Terri- 
tories for slavery to go iato, but what are arranged, as things now are, to any extent, 
unless it is north ofthat line. If we go no further than that, we simply say you 
shall take ni)thing by that vote that repealed it. That is all. Exclusion of slavery 
from the Territories, and leaving it uninterfered with in the States where it exists, 
as insisted on by the Republican platform, is, in my estimation, but practically re- 
storing the Missouri compromise, and I shall so call it in my remarks. 

TheVe may be other aspects of the question; but really when we disembarrass it, 
strip it of its collaterals and contingencies, and pi'csent it in its practical light, there 
is all there is of it. Is it then one of those subjects that call so loudly on all parts 
of the oountry, and especially on the South, for expressions of execration of us? It 
seems to me not. Tliere is not only nothing new in it, but there is nothing of the 
least apparent injustice in that which has been once fully agreed to, and I think 
never should have been disagreed to. 

Mr. BEN.JAMIN. I will not interrupt the Senator from Vermont by a question, 
if it embarrasses him at all in the course of his argument; but I would ask him if 
he intends referring, in the course of his remarks, to which I am listening with 
great interest, to the fact that the whole So\ith endeavored, by every possible 
means — by remonstrance, entreaty, and every other possible means — to get the gen- 
tlemen who now compose the Republican party to agree to just what that Senator 
says is what they now v/ant? 

Mr. COLLAMER. You mean to extend it to the Pacific? 

Mr. BENJxVMIN. Yes ; to leave that line, not only as a sacred line, as established 
in 1820, but to extend it to the Pacific; and the proposition now is to put it back, 
after you have extended the free States south of that line. 

Air. COLLAMER. What do you mean by that? California? 

Mr. BEN-J AMIN. You took possession of a Territory soutli of the line ; and after 
you have got that, now you say, restore the line back again. 

Mr. COLLAMER. If the gentleman will be a little patient, he will find that I 
shall not blink that point at all; but I do not understand it as he does. I have, 
however, no desire to avoid it. I expect to call attention to it. I said tliat, in rny 
opinion, that line should not have been obliterated. I cannot here but remark, in 
the first place, as to the making of it. The gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Hunter) 
in the course of this session spoke of that as being a northern aggression; and he 
made a discovery new to me, when he supposed the North made the line. The 
truth is the South made that line. I do not say that no northern men voted for it. 
There were a very few, enough, with the southern votes, to make a majority; but 
the great body, the majority, of its supporters were southern men. They made it. 



I actually heard with astonishment the honorable Senator from Virginia put that 
down as one of the nortliern aggressions. That is a new discovery to me. To my 
mind, that is very much like tlie man of whom I lieard during the Canadian difficul- 
ties, who said he was willing to go over there and help the Canadians to fight the 
British any time; and when asked wliy, he said, "the British are always pecking 
at somebody ; at one time they came into Boston and threw all our tea into the 
liarbor, and we have not got over that yet." (Laughter.) I think this is about as 
Eew a reading of history as that. But, sir, what purpose had that compromise line 
answered? What had the South got out of it? First, the making of that line ad- 
mitted Missouri ; it left Arkansas t^ be admitted south of it, and left all tlie country 
that could be formed into States anywhere sonth of 36° 30' to be made slaveliolding 
Territories, and so, of course, slaveliolding States. In the next place the South 
V'^anted Texas; we know what for. Undisguised was the object. Mi*. Calhoun offi- 
cially, as Secretary, of State, announced to the world that it was to be obtained to 
perpetuate slavery. There was no disguise about that. They wanted that. How 
did they get it? One among the means by whicli they obtained it, was this: they 
provided "that the line of 36° 30' should be continued across Texas. I know it 
■would not give much even if that had been kept. It did not amount to a great 
deal ; but I shall have occasion to refer to that again. Whatever was north of that 
line in Texas, was sequestered to the cause of freedom. That was one of the ele- 
ments that entered into the obtaining of the annexation of Texas. It was one of 
the means by which they effected that. Afterwards, there was a dispute growing 
out of what I thought there was never much ground for — a claim of Texas to a 
large quantity of land now forming part of New Mexico, and which was thus se- 
questered to the cause of freedom, if in Texas. The United States finally gave Texas 
$10,000,000 to quit-claim all her right to that territory and have it belong to New 
Mexico, where it would stand a chance of being slave territory, and would not fall 
within the saving of this clause of the Texas annexation resolutions. 

It is "not necessary to trace the history of the difficulties which were attempted 
to be settled, and in some measure were settled, by what were called the compro- 
mise measures of 1850; but the great point which was desired to be obtained by 
t'ae action of that year — professedly desired, and I do not know but really — was 
that Congress should settle the subject of slavery for all the country we then owned, 
as tlie compromise line of 1820 had settled the condition of the country in relation 
to all we then owned, and the ordinance of 1787 as to all we then owned. How 
was it settled in 1850? It was said tliat if Congress passed the measure?, in relation 
to Utah and New Mexico, and the other compromise measures then agreed upon, 
there would be no territory left about which to quarrel in relation to the subject of 
slavery; it would all be settled and arranged, and there would be, as they said at 
that time, a finality of that topic. Those compromise measures were passed. They 
were passed because the Missouri compromise line had settled all tlie Louisiana pur- 
chase, and they took it up there and settled all beyond ; and these two standing to- 
gether made a perfect provision for the whole subject in the whole LTnion. Thus it 
was that the Missouri compromise line entered as a very large element into the 
formation of the compromise measures of 1850. It was the leading ingredient in it, 
because that settlement was in relation to a larger and more important part of the 
country than the other. 

By means of this compromise line, the South had, from step to step, as I have 
stated, obtained these several advantages; and what do we come to next? Tliis 
had operated as a sort of stool-pigeon, a decoy, to enable them to go on, step after 
.step, with these various arrangements as they wanted. It quieted the North; it 
enabled them to obtain from the North these various measures. But, sir, when they 
had gotten them all through; when there was no more expectation of obtaining 
aiiything south of the line; when they had secured every advantage it was practi- 
cable to have from it, now they must just at once take down the stool-pigeon, de- 
stroy this deeojr, obliterate the line, and spretid their peculiar institution as much 
north of it as they could. That was attempted to be done in 1854, by the legisla- 
tion of that year. 

Now I come to the point that the Senator from Louisiana suggests. Why was 
that compromise repealed? Why was that line obliterated ? Here let me saj^ that 
the more excuses a man makes for a thing, the less we are satisfied with it. A good 
excuse or reason is perfect in itself; it is not made by collecting together half a 
dozen inqierfect ones; and I will now call attention to sowje of what are said to be 
the cause.; of tliat obliteration. First, we are told by the honorable Senator from 
Louisiana that the North were unfaithful to the agreement. I know the honorable 



Senator from Louisiana, in pnttinpf the question to me, does not nse those terms; 
but thev are the terms that are attempted to be used in preseutintr this proposition 
to tlie community ; that the North were nnfaithfnl and untrue to thht Missouri 
compromise line.' How? What do you mean by being true and fait<hful to a com- 
pact? What is meant by it in the English language? I take it, it is the carrying 
out and executing the compact according to its terms, according to the understand- 
ing of it when it was made. What was the understanding in relation to that com- 
promise line when it was made in 1820? ' It was to run through the iM-ench pur- 
chase — the Louisiana purchase, if you please — from the Mississippi river to the 
Jvocky Jloiintaiiis. Had not tliat always been carried out until it was repealed? 
"What had ever the northern people done that was untrue to tiiat compact? Is'othinK, 
nothing. Nothing is pretended. Tiien that pretended excuse is unfounded. The 
allegation that thev had been untrno to it themselves is simply untrue. 

But we are told that they would not vote to extend it after the Mexican war and 
oilr obtaining from JMexico territory towards the Pacific. It is paid they would not 
consent to exter.d that same line througli to the Pacific. In relation to that point, 
I say, tirst, it is no matter what their reason was; it is not true that there was any 
sort of obligation on them to make another bai'gain and extend it over other coun- 
try. It never was anv part of the original eom]iact that it was to be extended over 
other territorv; and therefore it is a matter of no sort of importance what their 
reason for their action was. I was not present ap the time those gentlemen objected 
to that. I am not' possessed of what their true reasons were. I do not think they 
needed any. When one man propose to anotlier to enter into a compact, he has 
simply to say, "I do not intend to entertain it." What then? It is very obvious 
that tlie gentlemen who represented the free States on that occasion were in a very 
different condition about tliat territory, for the country obtained from Mexico had 
no shiverv in it ; it had been abolished while the country belonged to Mexico; it 
was not a slaveholdiug country at all; and therefore thej'' probably may have 
thought, though I do not know it, that their constituents would not have approved 
of their making a l)argain to give away and make into slave territory tliat which 
■was already free, bv any means. But gentlemen say they agreed to divide the new 
Territories that were slaveholding. Very well; you may have been generous on 
that occasion ; that makes no demand on the other siile to recipi-ocate it <in a differ- 
ent occasion. But that is not the great difiTC\dty with the thing. Suppose the 
North, as you say, would not atjree to extend that line over the newly acquired ter- 
ritory: what then? Yon might find fault, if you pleased; perhaps you would 
have occasion to do so ; I do not say whether you would or not ; but this I saj- 
what sort of excuse can a man of common discernment make to another of similai 
character, to .say, "Sir, because you will not make this other additional bargain, I 
will break up the one 1 made myself" That is what you did do. You repealed 
the Missouri compromise line in the country called the Louisiana purchase, for whioh 
it was made, and to which it was confined. To my mind tliis is rather a lame ex- 
cuse ; in short, it is no excuse at all; but it is said that that was the reason why it 
was repealed. 

The next reason is the one which is put into the repealing bill. That bill, called 
the Kansas-Nebraska act, which repealed the eighth section of the ^Missouri act, 
does not say that it was repealed for any such cause as that which I have just no- 
ticed. It says that it was to be declared null and void ; because it v/as inconsistent 
with the principles of the compromise acts of 1850. Tliat is the reason given in the 
bill. I can merely say, that those who passed it put on the record that as the 
reason, and it is — I will not give it any bad name — a sort of equivocation for any 
man to resort to any other reason when he has recorded the one which he gave at 
the time; he is estopped from giving anj' others. That is an entirely different rea- 
son, and uttei-ly inconsistent with the first; and, besides, they are both false; for 
the latter one, though it was put on record that it was inconsistent with the com- 
promise of 1850, is just as wrong as the other. The fact is, that compromise of 
1850 was made on tlie ground that the former one of 1S20 was part and j>arcel of 
the arrangement; and therefore this excuse is equallj' unfounded with the other. 

But, Mr. President, I have now attended to three reasons for the repeal. The 
gentleman from Virginia found fault with the compromise of 1820, because, he said, 
the North made it, and it was an aggression when it was made. The next reason 
that is given is, that they would not extend it. The third reason is the one put into 
the bill, that it v.'as contrarj' to the compromise of 1850; but we have this session, 
aad perhaps within a short period before, got another rea^cto. It is sSiid that it is 



10 

iniconstitutional; that Congress was woll. justified in repealing it, because it ■was 
nnconstitntional. 

Mr. WIGFALL. With the consent of the Senator, I will ask him a question. I 
do not want to protract this debate, because I have a little matter that I want to 
get up after it is over ; but, just as a matter of curiosity, I should like to know 
what the Senator understands to have been the principle of the compron)is« of 1850 
as to Utah and New Mexico ? 

Mr. COLLAMER. It was tliis : there had been difficulties and controversies about 
the forming of territorial governments in those Territories. Congress could not 
agree on it. At first we had California in with them 

Mr. WIGFALL. Leave California out. 

Mr. COLLAMER. It was in it, and we cannot help it. It was in it for a year or 
two, until California formed a State government. Then, when it came to the com- 
])romise period of 1850, as part of tlie compromise, California was admitted as a, 
State. As to Utah and New Mexico, there had been bills, especially for New jNlexico, 
pending in Congress before that. Various measures had been proposed iu relation 
to them; the northern people insisting on the application of the provision of the 
ordinance of 1787, declaring that slavery should never exist there. They would not 
pass them without it. When Congress passed them, they were passed without that, 
and with a provision that the people migiit make them free or slave States, and that 
they should be admitted as they should be formed, whenever they should become 
States. 

Mr. WIGFALL. That was the principle? 

Mr. COLLAMER. That was the provision in relation to them. 

Mr. WIGFALL. Tiiat the Territories should settle it for themselves; and that 
Congress should not, in the meantime, interpose to prohibit the introduction of 
slavery ? 

Mr. COLLAMER. No, sir. When the gentleman says the Territories should 
settle it for themselves, he includes more than I understand it 

Mr. WIGFALL. I am not a squatter-sovereignty man. 

Mr. COLLAMER. That is a point you have got in that was not put in. It was 
put in in relation to Nebraska and Kansas; but it was not put in in relation to the 
others. 

Mr. WIGFALL. Did they not have the right to regulate their own affairs, with- 
out any interposition of Congress as to slavery ? 

Mr. COLLAMER. There was nothing said about that. 

Mr. AVIGFALL. Was there any interposition on the part of Congress, either to 
establish or prohibit slavery there ? 

Mr. COLLAMER. There was none. 

Mr. WIGFALL. Then the principle, if there was anjr principle involved in the 
Utah and New Mexico bills, was, that Congress should not legislate either to estab- 
lish or protect 

Mr. COLLAMER. You are drawing a con«lusion. 

Mr. WIGBWLL. I am asking for information. 

Mr. COLLAMER. The bills^are very plain. 

Ml". WIGFALL. These are liistorical facts; only philosophers oan give reasons. 
I was asking for a reason, possibh' ; but I want the Senator, before he goes on, to 
answer that. You see I am a new Senator yet, and do not undei'stand these ques- 
tions. Now, I understand — at least before I got liere I had supposed that the Utah 
and New Mexico bills left this question beyond all doubt — that Congress did not, in 
those bills, either interpose for or against slavery. Is that true, or is it not? 

Mr. COLLxVMER. I have stated about that. There had been a difficulty in form- 
ing those territorial govei'nmeuts, because a part of the country insisted on putting 
in the ordinance of 1787. 

Mr. WIGFALL, Yes, sir. 

Mr. COLLAMER. Congress could not agree to it; but when thej' had the making 
of the compromise of 1850, as part and parcel of it, these two Territories had ter- 
ritorial acts passed for them, which will speak for themselves, but they were passed 
without the prohibition of the ordinance of 1787. 

Mr. WIGFALIj. Pi'ecisely. Then I want to ask the Senator, when you come to 
form a new territorial bill as to Kansas and Nebraska, if you are not following out 
the precedent? I do not talk about the principle spoken of in the great speeches 
that were circulated in thousands and hundreds of thousands, but if the precedent 
was not followed when the Jrliasouri restriction was repealed and the Kansas-Nebraska 



11 

bill was passed, as the Utali and New Mexico bills were passed, without any provi- 
sion eitliei- favoring or disfavorini; slaverj'? That is the question. 

Mr. COI.LAMER. The t;entleiiiau has made his own sfieech, taking his own pre- 
mises, and drawing his own conclu.-ions. I can present very different views. I 
tliinlc that th;it whole coin)>roniise must be tiikeu together. 

Mr. WIGFALL. The ouuiibus was turned over, and tliey were passed as separate 
bills. 

Mr. COLLAMER. They were passed as separate bills, but the}' all constituted a 
compromise, and are so Sjioken of in the Ni-braska act. It was a compromise con- 
sisting of tliree or four acts passed here. That compromise put together made a 
whole, and I insist that it was a disintegration and destruction of the principle on 
which tiie}' went when you repealed tlie compromit-e line wliich settled the condition 
of a large part of the territory, and which settlement entered into and constituted 
part of tlie very compromise of 1850. 

Mr. ^VIGFALL. With the permission of the Senator, I will again draw his atten- 
tion to the fact that the Utali and Xew Mexico bills were passed without any provi- 
sion either establisliing or ])rohibiting slaver)', and that the Kansas-Nebraska bill, 
in order to be jiassed in accordance with that precedent, must necessai'ily have re- 
pealed the Jlissouri restriction, or it would have rec(\gnized the riglit of Congress to 
interi)ose. Therefore, what the Senator would call non-interposition, I call interpo- 
sition. What he would call non-intervention, I call intervention. As there had 
previo<isly passed a bill in 1820 

Mr. COLLAMER. The gentleman is making a speech of his own ; he has not 
nsked me a question. He is making up his own logic, stating his premises, and 
drawing his conclusions in his own way. I say all the parts of that compromi.so 
constitute a whole. They should be left to stand together, and I have already ex- 
plained what I considered entered into and constituted a part of it. Now gentlemen 
say, that when they came to pass a law making a territorial government for Kan- 
sas and Nebraska, they had to pass it like those for which they had a precedent. 
How was there any obligation to do that? Not the least in the world. If a man 
had sold land for ten dollars an acre, a large tract, and should afterwards sell a simi- 
lar amount to the same purchaser for twenty dollars, could he then say, "now you 
must give me twenty dollars for the first?" They liad made an-angements all about 
that line before; the compromise was made on that basis; and now, when tliej' 
came to make a territorial government, were they obliged to make it on the basis 
of the Utah act, passed since the line was arranged? 

I was stating the reasons which were attempted to be given for that repeal. The 
first, mentioned here by the Senator from Virginia, was that the North made it, and 
that it was an aggression ; the second was that it was not e.vteuded over other Ter- 
ritories, but a new bargain made for them; the third v/as, that it was inconsistent 
with the compromise of 1850 ; and the fourth is, that it was unconstitutional all the 
while. To my mind, this last is pretty ma^'h like Jack Fallstaif s, "I knew you all 
the while." It is an after-thought, a new discovery. Is it possible that these gen- 
tlemen can give that as an excuse for doing the thing when they did not explain it 
or state it at the time they did it? 

Again, is it becoming in these people to say, "We agreed to this proposition ; we 
made this arrangement with you in 1820; we have had our States admitted south 
of the line, according to it; we have had the consideration on our part, and now 
we turn around on you, and tell you we never had anv authority to make it, and 
We knew we had not when we did it; it was a great delusion from beginning to 
end?" The truth is, that, in common ethics, as well as in law, when a man exer- 
cises the power to do a thing, he is estopped from saying he had not the power. If 
a man sells me a horse as his, lie cannot afterwards, after taking Ids pay, tell me 
that the horse belonged to another man. He has no right to say it; he is estopped 
from saying it. So with those who exercised this power. They are not at liberty, 
•in law or in morality, to say that they had not the right to do it. It is totally im- 
material whelher the}' had or had not the power. With them, it should be held 
sacred ; for they did it. 

But, Mr. President, I have been unable to see what was the difficulty in this com- 
promise line, making it constitutional. Was it unconstitutional because it was not 
long enough ? Is it possible for you to say that if it had been extended to the Pacific it 
would have been a good and constitutional line? Here stands the honorable Sena- 
tor from Louisiana; a more ingenious lawyer certainly can seldom be found, what- 
ever may have been said about the Philadelphia lawyers; but he stands here and 
puts to me a question implying plainly that the difficulty was, we would not extend 



12 

the lina Then you wore willing to extend it and forbid slavery north of it clear to 
the Pacific? Yes. Then how had you a right to do it; or do you mean to ac- 
knowledge that you wvve then trying to play another ti-ick on us? I do not be- 
lieve anytl'.ing of this notion ; you did not believe it at the time ; and it is an excuse 
that should not be permitted to be made bj' any man. 

But, Mr. President, how lias the experiment of the repeal of the Missouri compro- 
mise, and the measures -vvhieh followed it, worked? What was involved in it? 
Wliat did it propose to do? If the honorable Senator fiom Texas (Mr. Wigkall) 
were now here, and designed to obtain my idea on this subject, he would probably 
obtain it. The Kausas bill was entirely a different bill from the New Mexico and 
Utah actrf. In that section repealing the Missouri compromise line, it not only de- 
clared that, being inconsistent with the ])viiiciples of the compromise of 185U, that 
line was thereby declare'! inoperative and void, but it further went on 1o piovide 
that Congress would neither legislate slavery into the Toi-ritoi-y, nor exclude it th.ere- 
from; but that the peojde thereof should be left perfectly free to regulate their do- 
mestic institution* in their own way, subject only to the Constitution of the United 
States Why did they ])ut in that last clause? I am very apt to forget it, because 
I have always supposed that all laws made within tliis nation, Avhelher by a State 
Legislature or by Congress, were subject to the Constitution as a matter of course. 
I liid not suppose repeating that could alter the fact. Still, there was a stress 
laid on that. Some gentlemen have s.-iid in the Senate, "We did not think that the 
p80[ile were invested with power to regulate tliis institution in tlieir own waj', con- 
Etitutionallj-;" and yet they voted for that bill, with that expression in it. 

The honorable Senator from Virginia said, last sessiofi, that he did not believe 
Congress had power to invest the people of a Territory with the authority of legis- 
lating and settling its institutions in their own way under tlie Constitution; but he 
agreed to give it to them, subject to the Constitution — meaning, thereby, to leave it 
to the courts. That seems to me to be a very extraordinary mental reservation — 
to vote for a law which was, in the opinion of the voter, unconstitutional, in order 
to leave the question to the courts! Congress did invest the people of the Terri- 
tory with that power, if they could, subject to the opinion of the courts, whether 
they could or not. I cannot but say, though it may be rather a harsh mode of illus- 
tratiug it, that it is like the Freneh'intidel otiicer going into battle, and praying the 
Lord, if tliere was one, to save his soul, if he had any. (Laughter.) Tliat is to say, 
" we give this power, if we have power to give it; but we do not believe we have 
any power to give it." That is your position. 

That was a very different bill from the others, Utah and New Mexico. I know it has 
been said since, that really and in fact nothing was meant by all that rigmarole of words, 
except that when the people came to form a State constitution, they could make it a 
free or' a slave State, as the}- pleased. Then, that action was very unuecessaiy. There 
is no doubt that, if gentlemen desire to make issues amongst themselves, that is a 
matter for their consideration. No man can mistake the expressions of that bill; 
and those expressions were not put in there for any such purpose as is now pretend- 
ed by some; and I can tell you why. The very provision of the New Mexico and 
Utah act, wherein it was provided that tbey"^should be admitted either with or 
without slavery, as should be provided in the constitutions when they came to form 
a State — that very expression was already in the Kansas-Nebraska act, eight sec- 
tions before the other words to which I have alluded. It was all provided ftir be- 
fore you came to the repealing provision. That was not there, then, for any such 
purpose. It evidently does mean, as il provides, that the people there, while a Ter- 
ritory, and as a Territory, should settle the matter in their own way. 

I will not now enter into the question whether they could or could not; but that 
was tiie Dower given. Were they'left to form it in their own way ? Certainly not. In 
the very beginnine:, in the choosing of the very first Teri-itorial Legislature, more 
than four tliousand men under arms from Missouri invaded and subjugated them, and 
made their election. They never were left free to act in their own way ; and then fol- 
lowed all the extraordinary laws and means which were resorted to, and all the vio- 
lence which resulted; this" Government saying that it would not correct ^anything, 
and those laws should be carried into effect with the whole power of the Govern- 
ment; together with the ravages of war, and bloodshed, and burning, and desolation, 
which went over Kansas Territory. These all foliovred your act. Did you think 
they were worse than other people? What were you attempting to do? You 
were attewiptiug to have a Territory that should be a' sluveholding Territory and a 
free Territory lit the same time; and you could not make it go through. In the 
nature of things it cannot. . The people supposed their territorial government was 



13 

to settle the question. The Missoiirians went ovei', and cliose tlie territorial tjovern- 
iiient, because they understood it w;is to settle it. All understood it so at ihat time. 
Tliiit was an entirely diiFerent thing- from the New Mexico and Utah bills. That 
■was a new experiment attempted. 

How has it worlced? Is anybody so much satisfied with the results and effects 
of that experiment that he desires to push it fiii-ther* 1 do not believe there are 
many. The people of the North believe tiiat was all wi-oiig ; in the first place, 
because it was contrary to the original policy of the Government. In the next 
place, the\" do not believe it is beneticiHl to the country to turn it over to the peo- 
ple, on the plains of Kansas, to tight out a subject of this kind in which the nation 
is iiiterested. It never was tried before, atid I trust will never be tried aijain. 

But, Mr. l^resident, it is said great danger will rosidt from the action of the Republi- 
can party, if they should really apply their principles; if they should reestablish the 
Missouri compromise line and stop the spread of slavery in the Territories, which tiie 
repeal of iheline attempted to elfect. We propose to do nothing more and nothing less 
than restore the Missouri compromise by excluding slavery from the Territories ; and 
if we should carry it out, does not that make a pretty fair division of this country' ? 
Vv'e have, in round luunbei-s, about one-third of our peojile in the slaveholding States. 
"\Ve liave about two-thirds of them in the free States. We have about three million 
square miles, in round numbers. It does not diti'er a hundred thousand from that. It 
is very fully shown, from the best evidence and tlie best iiilormatiou, as collected and 
collated b\' Professor Henry, and to be found in the agricultural report, in 1S.5G, that 
there is a little more than one-third of this whole country that is incapable of set- 
tlement. We may be unvv'illing to acknowledge that to ourselves; but that is the 
fact. As st;ited by the Senator from Georgia, and which I believe is true, the slave- 
liolding States now have withiu their territory, (and they are in the occupancy of 
eight hundred and lift}- thousand square miles,) almost one million, of the best part 
of the country. Tlie}' are but about one-third of the people. There will be left, 
{■lien, for the other two-thirds of the inhabitable part of our country, one million 
one hundied and fifty- thousand square jniles. Have they not nmch the larger part? 
Have they not got the best part? Can gentlemen .sa-,' now, that, when we declare 
the}' shall be and ought to be confined to that, we are trying to smoke them out? 
It is the other side that is in trouble. The free people, with their institutions, ac- 
cording to numbers, are about to be restricted to less than their proportion of the 
country, and they are to be smoked out or starved out, if either. 

Wliat, then, should prevent us from doing this justice? What is there wrong in 
it? What is there unprecedented in it? What is tliere unjust in it? Certaiidy 
nothing. But still it will not do, they say, to have a llepublican President chosen ; 
it will be a cause of dissolution. Why? Because the}- say some of the free States 
have passed unfriendly laws to that provision of the Constitution aliout fugitives 
from labor. Mr. President, in relation to those laws, [ would call gentlemen's atten- 
tion to this: it certainly is the exclusive duty and obligation, as well as privilege, of 
every State to protect the liberties and lives and property of its own citizens. I say 
it is exclusively their duty within their own territory. 

I not very unfrequently, especially among \inlettered people, hear it asked, why 
Congress cannot aljolish slaveiy? and I cannot but say that I think at times there 
have been uome mistaken notions, like those suggested by the Senator from Te.xas, 
about this being a consolidated Government, and talk' of that kind. Take the 
plainest case imaginable. Here is a man, if you please, in a northern State, confined 
by another as a laborer in his cellar, chained, for years. Tlfe whole power of the 
United States Government cannot affect it. They have no power to grant anj' relief. 
Just so in the southern States; no matter how many men they hold in bondage, if 
you call it such, it is a matter exclusively theirs; Congress has no power over it. 
If they, as some of them do, propose to reduce to bondage a large number of men 
•who are free, no matter how we may look on it, it is utterly beyond the reach of 
the power of Congress. So, on the other hand, 1 take it, the right and duty to )iro- 
tect their own citizens in their liberties and lives is the exclusive duty and privilege 
of the States. 

It is not true, as was properly suggested by the honorable Senator from Ohio 
(Mr. Wade) yesterday, that because the South have a right to pursue and take tlieir 
slaves that run away, and bring them home, therefore every man in a free State is 
subject to being taken away. Let us think, for a few moments, of the decisions on 
that subject. In 1842, came the decision of the Prigg case. That case contained 
some pretty important things, new to the country at that time. We may have 
become familiarized with them now ; but they called for the action of the States. 



u 

The-Supre®i« Cowrfc decided in tliat case that the owner of a fugitive slave had 
the right to pursue him into a tree 8tate, without any process wliatever, to take that 
slave, recapture him, and carry him home. I take it that it is the privilege and duty 
of every Stt.te ta so nirange the manner in which a man exercises hit- riglits, that 
the rights ^iu\ privileges of otiier;? may he secure. Tiiat is a matter of legitimate 
legislation. We Slave, for instance, in the State in which I live, a considerable 
number of frae ool-ored citizens. 1 do not know their number now — a thousand, 
perliaps more. Th«y are just as much entitled to the protection of the laws as the 
white men. Whea «his opinion was pronounced by the Sujireme Court, that a per- 
son could come ther£ and take a man, claiming him a3 a fugitive slave, and carry 
him away Avithout.any process whatever — for the coni-t said he might do it, if so be 
that lie committed .n© illegal violence — was it not obvious that our colored popula- 
tion could be in no vway safe, I do not say against honest and honorable slaveholders, 
but agiiitist all men^v.'ho might come to claim them — slave dealers? They could not 
be safe, if there wfis to ibe no process, if no court was to pass upon it, if nobody 
was to int-eSi'fere with it. If he was to exercise this right without any limitation, or 
without any. Arrangement or control, how could they be safe ? It was very natural, 
and did happen, as the SeEator from Geoigia says, that in Vermont they began as 
early as lS44r.; yes, -Sir, two years after that decision. AVhen they understood the 
decision, th^"^ did. 6>iy,''']N'65v, this will not do. AVe cannot have our people sub- 
jected to this sort of arrest. If these men have the power to arrest him ; if they 
are entitled to a man as a slave, let there be due process ; let there be given to 
our people soaie sort of -seeyrity." Therefore they did pi'ovide that the taking of 
a slave witboufc process shoul-i be unlawful — illegal. Was there anj-thing extraordi- 

:nsa-y in tkat? Can you see^in that notliing but enmity to that provision of the Coii- 

TStitiition? Clearly, not at all. 

That case further decided,. too, that State magistrates might act under the law of 
1793; if th<83' pkased, not otherwise ; but if the States forbade it, they could not. 

"•fhfij decided another thing : that this subject of the reclaiming of fugitives from 
Irt'bor was peeuliarh'' and exclusively the business of the General Government. 
The}' decided n«)t only that tiie States had no right to interfere with it, but they 
said they kad no right even to make a law to carry it into effect. I know tliat 
Judge Taney* and Judge Daniel differ as to that ; they dissented on that point; but 
all the rest -of the court, I believe — unless, perhaps, Judge McLean, certainly Judge 
Story and & majoiity of the court — decided that all laws made by the States, tending 
to secure fugitives, were utterly null and void. Therefore the States were, by that 
decision, rele-ased from all obligations. They were not expected to do anything 
abosit it, frt<;nd!y or unfriendly. It does not seem to me that there can be any good 
ground to eomplaiii in relation to the States not carrying into effect the fugitive 
Blav« law. or that provision of the Constitution, when the}^ were distinctly and ex- 
pressly told it was none of their busu)ess ; and that all the laws they could pass 
about it, or in any way inconsistent with that provision of the Constitution, were 
simply and utterly void. 

The legislation which was made on that occasion in my State provided for the 
security of our citizens by the act of 1844, of which the Senator from Geoi-gia com- 
plains, though I do not understand from his note one thing. He saj'S that our act 
denies to the district court of the United States power to entertain a habeas corpun. 
I do not know but that may be so ; but it is out of my mind, and I think it is not 
the fact. But when our people said their shei'ilfs and justices should not interfere 
•with it, and that our people should not be taken without process of law, the}' fur- 
ther provided that nothing in that act should be considered as extending to any 
person that was acting as a United States judge or marshal, oi' anybody acting under 
him. It is true that other legislation has since takoi place, ^v hen, in 1850, the 
new fugitive slave law Avas made, it is true that was received in that quarter 
much as the Senator from Ohio says it was in his State. It was obnoxious, abhor- 
rent ; it was against the feeling of our people, and especially that part of it which 
required them to become aids and assistants in following and running after alleged 
fugitives, under heavy penalties. 

It is said that this act was essentially the act of 1793. We did not view it so ; 
we do not now. By this act, certain men called commissioners, who were appointed 
by the district courts, are clothed with certain powers. Those commissioners had 
existed before that. They existed by law, appointed by the courts for certain pur- 
poses. Those purposes were to take depositions, to bind over criminals, take bonds — 
in short, all the preparatory steps looking to a trial in some court. But they were 
mere ministerial officers, with no power of adjudication, no power of decision. 



15 

TJncier the lnvr of 170S, in relation to fugitives from justice:, all Ihat is done i« to 
return the miin who is a fugitive from justice to some other State, for the purjiose of 
taking Jiis trial there. It looks to a tiial. It is a mere preparatory step. Jiut when 
YOU eame to this law of 1850, to all pi'actie;il purposes the conmiissioiier is clothed 
with final power of adiudiealioii, which is entirely a new feature. 

I know justices miglit send a man out under the act of 1793, if they pleased to act; 
but that v/as all safe," as they were our own officers. So far as tiie courts, the district 
judges, or circuit judges, are clothed with authority, the acts of 1S50 and 1793 are 
alike^ but, as i-espects the powers with which tiie commissioners are clothed, they 
flre utt>3rly unlike. When an application is made to a commissioner, and a man is 
brought before him, said to be a fugitive from labor, he hears and decides the case, 
lie sends him, if you please, from i\'ew England to Texas. I do not know but lliat 
a man mishtclaini another as a fugitive from labor who was an apprentice. The 
very firstnuiu, if you please, of the State of Virginia or Georgia, m:ght find some 
one coming and claiming his sou as an apprentice, for service due in California; and 
the commissioner must send him there. You will observe, the conunissioner does not, 
in this ca^e, send back the man, as the fugitive from justice is sent, for the purpose 
of taking his trial in some court. lie sends him definitely ; it does not look to any 
court. Jt is not a ministerial act, preparatory- to trial anywhere. It is not a step 
preparing him to be tried by any court. It is ultimate, definitive, to all practical 
purposes. Our people look xii>on this as different entirely. 

^Ir. 3IAS0N. The Senator will allow me to make an inquiry of him. I under- 
stood the Senator to say that there were powers conferred on these commissionei's, 
by the act of 1850, which had not been conferred upon the judicial officers men- 
tioned in the act of 1793. 

Mr. COLLAMER. I did not sE>y so. 

Mr. MASON. Well, I understand the Senator to say that power is conferred on 
these commissioners to adjudicate. Now I ask the Senator, power to adjudicate what? 

Mr. COLLAMER. Whether tlie man is a fugitive from labor or not. 

Mr. MASON. The Constitution of the United States says that if a person held to 
labor or service in one State shall escape into another, he shall be delivered up upoa 
the demand of the claimant, 

Mr. COLLAMER. To whom the service is due. 

Mr. MASON. Upon the demand of the claimant to whom the service is alleged 
to be due, or is due. 

The requirement of the Constitution is, that if a person held to service escape, he 
shall be delivered up to that person to whom the service is due. 

Mr. SEWARD. On claim. 

Mr. MASON. lie shall be delivered up, not to the pei'son to whom the service is 
due, because tliat would lead to that inquiry; but he shall be delivered up to tiie 
claimant. Now, I would submit to the Senator this : what does the Constitution 
submit to the party who is to adjudicate? Does it submit anyrhiug more than the 
questioLi, vvhether the alleged fugitive was held to service in the State from which 
he escaped ? Does it submit an inquiry whether he was rightfully held to service, or 
does it submit the single question, was he held to service, whetlier rightfully or 
wrongfully, and did he escape? Having had something to do with the law of 1S50, 
I aver that that law submits to the judicial authority that single inquiry: was he 
held to service? without inquiring whetlier he was rightfully or wrongfully held — 
was he held to service, and did he escape? If it is found that he was held to ser- 
vice, and did escape, the Constitution requires that he shall be delivered up, and the 
law says so. That is the whole of it. 

Mr. COLLAMER.. All that does not relieve the subject at alL The gentleman all 
the while seems to presume that no man can be taken up under that law, unless he 
is a runaway slave. That is an entire assumption. A man, and especially a colored 
man, in New England, who never was out of the State of Vermont, might be 
claimed a.s a slave and arrested and brought before n commissioner. Those are the 
people we are trying to protect, and those are the people we are bound to protect, 
and those are people whom our law is meant to protect. The gentleman from Vir- 
ginia may state it as formally as he pleases; after all, has not the commissioner to 
decide this: was John Doe, now standing before me, dc facto, if the gentleman pleases, 
not de jure — I do not make that point, but I am putting it on his own ground — bound 
to service, under the laws of Virginia, to the honorable Senator from Virginia? Were 
j-ou, or were you not ? that is tlie question. I do not say that the commissioner is to 
go in^o an inquiry of whether the law that bound him was good or not. That is not 
the point I am at ; but wheu he is claimed to have naa away from Texas as a fugitive 



16 

elftve, n,nd lie is hroiight before the commissioner, the question for flie commissioner 
is, is tliis man a fugitive slave ? and if he decides that lie is, goes to Texas into slavery 
withoxit any trial, unless you call tliat a trial. That is not a [)reparat(>ry step ; th.at 
is not ministerial; tliat is not ialroductory to some other ])rocecding; it is definitive, 
practically final. 

Our people dislike this feature of tlie law. It submits to the comniissiouer the 
question as to identity of the man claimed, whether lie is a man bound to service or 
not. I do not say he is to decide whether the man was rightfully or wrongfully 
bound to service; but I mean he is to decide whether lie was the man that escaped 
— the fugitive — and if he is, wliat then* Are j'ou to take lum back, as you would 
a fugitive from justice, for a trial? Xot at all. That is the trial, practically the 
only trial. Our people look upon that as a difterent thing. Tiiey did indeed pro- 
vide, as the gentleman from Georgia charges, and I desire to ti'rn attention to that. 
lie complains, in the appendi.x to his speech, that 
"Vermont pledges the whole power of the State to maintain the claim of the slaves to freedom." 

Ko such thing. It does provide 

Mr. MASON. If the Senator will allow nie to interrupt him — I will not unless 
it is agreeable to him — I wish this thing right as far as the law for the reclamatioa 
of fugitive slaves is concerned; and I do not see tliat there should be any difference 
between the honorable Senator and myself. The honorable Senator says now that 
I reason upon the law as if it was a law made to reclaim fugitive slaves, but that I 
do not reason upon it as if it might possibly be extended to one who was not a slave. 
]S"ow, sir, the Constitution says nothing about slaves, uor does the law. 

Mr. COL LAMER. I used the shortest term. 

Mr. MASON. Very well. The law follows the. Constitution. The Constitution 

says that 

"No person held to service or labor in one State, under the laws thereof, escaping into another, 
shall, in conseqnenoe of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from aucti service or hibor, 
but shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such service or labor may be due." 

The law follows the Constitution. Its provisions are these, very briefl}' : upon 
the proofs to be adduced by the claimant, if it shall apjiear to the judicial officer in 
the State where tlie fugitive is arrested, that he was held to service or labor in the 
State from which he escaped, and that such service or labor was due to the claim- 
ant, he shall be delivered up on the faith of the Constitution — no inquiry whether 
that service or labor was' rightfully or wrongfully due. 

Now, the honorable Senator says that that is final; that it is not, as in the case 
of a fugitive from justice, preliminary only as to the guilt, but it is final. Final, 
how? Does that honorable Senator mean to intimate that there is a State of this 
Union where x\tVican bondage is recognized — and to one of those States this fugitive 
slave must be reconveyed — v.'here the most ample, plenary, sedulous provision is 
not made to give every negro who is claimed as a slave the amplest opportunity, 
-without fee or reward, to have the question tried there whether he is a slave or 
not? If that be true, the proceedings of the commissioner may be final or not, as 
the case may be. If the person is really a slave, when he is surrendered to his 
master, it is final. If he is not a slave, let him be taken wherever the sun shines 
upon a slave State, to make a complaint any wbere, in any village, at any cross-road, 
or on any highway, to the neighbors, that he is a freeman, and I will tell that hon- 
orable Senator, if he does not know it, that there would not be a voice in that whole 
community that would not insist upon his being remitted to all tlie privileges and 
securities which the law gives him — to a trial which is provided for at the public 
expense — to decide whether he be a slave or not. Those are the facts. 

Mr. COLLAMER. I choose to make no issue with gentlemen from the slavehold- 
inc States in relation to the generosity, liberality, or anything of that kind, of their 
people. Indeed, I am free to acknowledge that 1 think they are generally quite as 
frank and liberal people as any, and I tliink they are great deal better than their 
institutions. Their institutions I regret; the goodness of the people I do not. I sa'd 
that the commissioner's decision was final to all practical ])ur|ioses. I know it is said 
t!ie courts are open to him ; and Dr. Johnson said, "so is the city cofteediouse free lo 
furnish a man with a good dinner, if he has the money." I said this step was not pre-, 
liminary to any suit. I say so now. I can be easily understood in that, if you desire 
to understand me. AVheu you enter a regular complaint against a man for a crime, 
and you send to another State to bring him, it is to bring him into court to answer 
to that oftense charged against. him in a proceeding already instituted aird pending 
iu a co'iu't. Then I say the order to return such a man, for such a purpose, is pre- 



17 

limiiiary; but when you come to a fugitive from labor or service, is the action of 
the commifsioner a step preliminary to anything of that kind ? I do not say there 
conld not be a suit brought afterwards by the man who is carried away as a slave 
to Texas 

Mr. .MASON. I will not interrupt the Senator hereafter. If he will fasten that 
quarrel upon the Constitution, 1 will not defend the Constitution; but I insist upon 
the quarrel being fastened upon the Constitution, and not upon the law. 

Mr. COLLAMER. Well, 1 do not choose to make that a point. I am not like the 
man who when the serraou did not please him, found fault with the text. 1 shall 
not find fault with the text any way. (Laughter.) Certain it is, then, that I am 
well founded in ray distinction, that this is not a preliminary proceeding. It may 
be that the man can bring an action after he is carried away to Texas. I mention 
Texas simply because it is one of our most distant States. lie is carried away to 
Texas, an entire stranger, and in utter poverty and deslitution. Perhaps he could 
assert his rights there, but he would be much like the man getting his dinner at the 
city coffee house, if he had no money to buy it. The court being open does not 
assist him any. Besides he is not in a condition to go there. All his witnesses are 
in Vermont or ilassachusetts where he was born. 

The whole of these arguments go on the ground that gentlemen from the South 
really su]-)pose, they have it at all times on their minds, that nobody else will be 
arrested bat a fugitive. We are not safe that way, and our people have made some 
laws with a view to the security of their citizens on that account. They were not 
satisfied with leaving the question entirely to these commissioners, who, the Sena- 
tor sa3-s, are judicial officers, but with no judicial powers in them; who are not sub- 
ject to impeachment or trial. They were not satisfied with that condition of things. 
They did not like the law ; but that was not all. 

Another crisis came. Some time afterwards it was regularly decided by the Su- 
preme Court that the descendant of an African negro was not entitled to any rights 
which white men were bound to respect at all. Suppose a man comes after a fugi- 
tive slave, as you choose to call him — perhaps one of your slave stealers in the 
southern States may come Xorth, and steal easier there — he gets a description of 
the man, and gets afiidavits in due form, comes into the Xew England States, or 
Kew York, and seizes a man answering that description ; takes liim to a commis- 
sioner, a stranger, and adduces his proof. IIow can we be safe? How can our 
people be secure against this; especially, I say, when it was holdeu, as I have stated, 
that he had no rights' Theu it comes to this: if you come and get a fugitive slave, 
all very well ; if you get a man that never was a fugitive slave at all, it is just as 
well, because he has no rights that you are bound to respect. 

So we saw, from step to step, that there was no securitj' for our colored popula- 
tion whatever, except what the State, in its almost utter imbecilitj-, might give. 
Kow, I can say, that whatever statutes have been passed, so far as my State is con- 
cerned, I believe were passed with no intention to avoid and break down this pro- 
vision of the Constitution. They may run counter to it; tliey may look, upon their 
face, as if they were intended to defeat it; but our people always expect their laws 
to be subject to the Constitution. Tl;ey expect that their own courts and the Su- 
preme Court of the United States will set aside as void any law thej' m.ake that 
contravenes any provision of the Constitution. They ex]>ect that, though they do not 
put in the words, "subject to the Constitution of the United States." (Laughter.) 
I may saj' further to ecnllemen, that if there be any such statutes in Vermont as do 
conti-avene that provision, they will be as readily decided to be unconstitutional, 
I venture to declare, by the supreme court of that State as they would be by the 
Supreme Court of the United States. 

I know, Mr. Pi-esident, that our sHpreme court is chosen annually by the Legi.sla- 
ture, but they make no distinction amungst parties. The present chief justice of 
that court has been upon tliat bench for twenty-three years, always a Democrat; a 
Democrat to begin with, and is now and always has been, and I am afraid always 
will be, for he recently published a letter in favor of the whole programme. His 
sentiments are well known. We expect our laws to be decided constitutional or 
unconstitutional by our own courts, and especially to abide bj' the decisions of the 
Supreme Court of the United States. We have no expectation of making any war 
on them. If it should happen that any of our laws are really unconstitutional, I 
hardly think that it lays the foundation of charging men with perjury and treason, 
and all the words of vituperation and invective that the English language can fur- 
nish, because we may happen to be mistaken. 

Sir, when the State of Georgia passed a law, that a man who resided in the Indian 



18 

terntory in that State, by license of the President, and by consent of the nation, as 
a missionary for a long time, should not be allowed to remain there without license 
from their Governor, and made it finally a penitentiary offense if he did, they took 
a citizen of Vermont and imprisoned him in the peuitenliary. The Supreme 
Court of the United States decided that law of theirs was unconstitutional The 
gentleman (Mr. Toombs) says that, after all the man did not get that certified, so 
that the court of Georgia did not disobey it. True it is, that man, with the other 
gentleman in the same position, was given very distinctly to understand that 
he could not get out of prison in that way, but that if he would cease his prosecu- 
tion he miglit be pardoned; and as the only hope to get out they did cease, and 
they were ])ardoned. Now, sir, I do not think that the State of Georgia should 
have imputed to it any bad design or improper motives about that. 

Mr. President, I caiinot but here say, that, to my mind, the fact of a State passing 
unconstitutional laws, furnishes no foundation for what gentlemen claim. I deny that 
any State in this Union can lay the foundation for a dissolution of the Union by pi\ssing 
unconstitutional laws. The doctrine of the Senator from Georgia i?, that if a State, or 
several States, pass laws contravening the Coustitutiou of the United States, and which, 
if you please, are injurious to others; in that case the compact is broken, aod the other 
States are at liberty to treat it as vacated whenever they please. I deny that doc- 
trine. I deny, in the first place, that the States, as several States, entered into this 
compact. That, however, is repeated so often that, upon the whole, 1 do not know 
but it is believed. When a State acts, it acts in its organized capacity, by its organs, 
by its legislature, or by its Executive. There never was one of tlie States of this 
nation that acted in that way in the adoption of the present Constitution. The 
people of the United States, meeting in the conventions in their several States, 
adopted the United States Constitution. The States never acted on it as States. It 
would be a ])arHdox that the}' should have done so. How could the Legislature of 
Korth Carolina, for instance, invested as it was, at that time, by the people with 
the power to levy and collect duties upon imports; how could the State, in its or- 
ganized" capacity, through that organ delegate that jiower to another body? It 
could not be done. It never was done. It never was attempted to be done. The 
people of the United States had to meet in their several States in their original 
condition, as people in convention, for these reasons: first, it was more convenient; 
next, if the people of North Carolina had invested their Legislature with the power 
to levy and collect duties, the people of North Carolina alone would have the power 
to invest that in another body; to wit, Congress. If you called the whole people 
of the United States, it would be a different set of people to take that power away 
from the one who gave it. No, sir, it is not true that this is in that sense a Confede- 
racy. It is a national Government I say it is a national Government, operating 
by its own act on individuals, and enforcing its own laws by its own executive 
power. The old Confederation was a failure. This is a national Government. 

If these things be true, can it be possible that any State in this Union can dissolve 
it, or, if you ptease, lay a foundation for others to dissolve it, by passing unconsti- 
tutional laws? It is utterly destructive of the whole principle of this Government. 
There is no foundation for it at all Then I deny that, because laws may have been 
passed, mistakenly if you i)lease, that were unconstitutional, against the United 
States Constitution, that is any foundation for a dissohition of this Government. 
But there is another very strange thing in all these assertions; and that is, that 
upon a certain contingency, the election of a Republican President, the Union is to 
be dissolved on account of those laws. Pray, what relationship is tliere between 
them? It is pretty much like one man telling'another, "If yon had not caned me to- 
day for my insolence, I would have paid you that debt a month ago." (Laughter.) 
The next point made upon us is, that it will not do to go on with the Republican 
party in possession of the Government, because gentlemen say we are going to 
break down the Supreme Court. There is another principle of our party mentioned 
in this connection, and that is, that v»e are going to exclude the South fi-om the Ter- 
ritories. On this last point I have already said all that I wisls to say. This is ex- 
actly what has been done from the beginning. It is the very thing the Governmeiit 
was made for. Now, in relation to breaking down the Supreme Court, I have but a 
few words to saj'. 

I have always understood, as a lawyer, that the judgment of a court was binding 
upon the parties and privies — no more. It is binding upon the parties to thesuit, 
and upon all who claim under them, who are privy to it. There it ends. The judg- 
ment of a court of competent jurisdiction is to be executed to that extent, and there 
it stops. The United States, 1 take it, were never a party to the Dred Scott decis- 



19 

ion, nor a pvivj- to it in any legal sense. Tlien it has no binding force, as a judg- 
ment, on the United States. iSliould it have any force as a precedent or authority i 
It was a political decision as to the jiower of the Government to forbid slavery in 
the Territories. That is a question relating to the exercise of the polilical power 
of a coordinate branch of the Governaient. If that is not political, I do not know 
what is. Well, now, how has that always been viewed? 

Some yeai's since, the Supreme Court very deliberately decided that the Bank of 
tlie United States was constitutional. Tlie Democratic platform, 1 believe, even in 
the last version, following its predecessors, contains an express resolution that it is- 
unconstitutional. We see, tiien, how it is understood, by that [)arty at any rate, 
tliat a decision of the Supreme Court on a point of that kind is good for nothing at 
all, imworthy of any respect, and that their own party decisions in their platform 
are of higher authority, more validity, and more binding. I do not choose to 
quarrel about that. It "is a matter between them and the court. I take it. how- 
ever, as authority, and it seems to me that, at any rate, gentlemen who stand tipoa 
that platform ought not to insist much on the decisions of tlie court. 

But, Mr. President, the Dred Scott decision, as a precedent — and certainly that is 
its 0UJ3' effect on us in point of law — I take it, is neither infallible nor inscrutable. 
1 hardly think any gentleman will stand here and say that he claims for tiie decis- 
ion of the Supreme Court, as precedent and authority, that we should bow down to 
it as we would to the inscrutable dispensation of Divine Providence; or that we 
should even say blasphemously of it, "the Lord has given, the Lord has taken 
awaj- ; blessed be the name of the Lord." This will not be claimed, I ajiprehend. 
Then it is to be examined; and its worth as a precedent dejtends on llie soundness of 
the ai'guraents that sustain it and the i^rineiples on which it stands. If it has any 
weight, it is that; and, by the way, if the arguments ai-e good to sustain the prin- 
ciple, they would be ju^t as good without the decision of the Supreme Court as 
with it. 

Kow, Mr. President, I wish to examine this decision of the Supreme Court a little. 
They expend a great amount of time in undertaking to show that tl;e power of the Gov- 
ernment over tiie territory beyond the Mississippi, territory which vv-as not owned at 
the adoptiem of the Constitution, does not arise and exist under the territorial clause 
of the Constitution — I mean the clause giving Congress power to make all needful 
rules and regulations. I care very little about that. I think it is totally unfounded 
in its reasons on that point, but i care very little about it for another reason. The 
court say that there is, after all, a power in this Government to obtain territory by 
conquest or treaty. They further say, that there must necessarily be, incident to 
that power and to the power to admit States, authority, when the Government has 
acquired a Territory, to frame a Government for it, so as to pass it through a con- 
dition of pupilage, and prepare it for admission as States. I care very little whether 
the power came from that clause or not ; they say there is that power, any way ; 
and they say that, in framing the laws for that jnirpose, it is in the discretion of 
Congress to make provision : it is not for the cosrt to say what form of government 
they shall give it. They saj^ further, tliat, the territory being a part of the United 
States, " the citizens enter it under authority of the Constitution, with their respec- 
tive rights marked out and defined." But they say "this power is in the discretion 
of Congress," and that, of course, they are to frame the form of government in such 
a way as they believe will best advance the interests of the whole people. 

They then spend some time discussing whether, in doing that, Congress can exer- 
cise any y>owers except some that are delegated expressly by the Constitution. I 
look upon all that ])art of the opinion as mere talk, because they say that the Con- 
stitution has not delegated to Congress any power to govern the territory obtained 
after the Constitution was adopted ; that that is merely incidental to their power 
to obtain territory. Of course there is nothing in the Constitution by wl:ich it is 
said what the forms of power shall be that they shall exercise tliere. But they then 
come to talk about another topic. Thev say that Congress, in the exercise of power 
in the Territories, can do nothing that is expressly prohibited by the Constitution. 
Very well; let us take it so. They go on to enumerate a number of things that 
they saj- Congress car.not do. For instance: they cannot estaldish a religion, can- 
not abridge the freedom of speech or of the press, cannot aboli>Ii trial by jury, and 
so on, naming things that are expressly forbidden in the Cowstitution. is it any- 
where forbidden in the Constitution that Congress shall prohibit slaves being carried 
there? All the prohibitiotis they mention are express prohibitions. Is there such 
an express proliibition as that? How can you read into the Constitution a prohibi- 
tion among those that are there, which is not there? That is what is attemjited to 



20 

be done. How do tliey get at it? In this way: tliey say, in tlie first place, that 
slaves are propert}', so recognized by the Constitution; in the second place, that 
everj'body has a light to go to the Territories with every kind of property; and, 
in the third place, that to prohibit their doing so, is to violate the fifth amendment 
of the Constitution, wliich says that no person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or 
property, without due process of law. 

In making up this syllogism, each proposition in it, whether major or minor, and 
the ultimate conclusion, are equally important. In the first place, then, are slaves 
propert_y ? The court utterly disregarded their own decisions on that subject in 
makiug tliis. I think if anything can be established from the decisions of courts it 
is that slavery exists by local law, confined to the territory over which the law is 
operative ; and if persons held in slavery go out of and be5'ond that territory, they 
are no longer slaves ; and if slaves are property by the law within that territory, 
they are not without it. In relation to this point, whether slaves are property 
beyond the States so recognizing them, I deny the major proposition, to begin with. 
I say the very language of tiie Constitution implies the contrary. It says that if 
a person holden to service under the laws of one State escape into another, he shall 
be returned. "Held to service!" — how? Under the laws of a State. "Held to 
service under the laws thereof," is the language. 

When that man bound to service in one State escapes into another State, is he 
property there? Can the master go and take him there, and keep him there, and 
sell him* there, and use him there? If he is like other property, and the Supreme 
Court says it is preciselj- the same as other property, all that would be true ; but we 
know it is not. That provision of the Constitution declares all laws of other States 
that would release him from the service void ; that is all. It contemplates that 
such laws might be passed, but says they shall not have that efl'ect. It does not 
discharge him from the service in the State where he belongs, and only provides for 
the man being surrendered up and taken where he belongs, and where he owes the 
service. TlieSupreme Court of the United States, in the case of Prigg vs. Pennsyl- 
vania, decided tlie very same thing. They in so many words decided that slavery 
was a mere local matter ; I will cite their very words : 

" The state of slavery is deemed to be a mere municipal regulation, founded upon and limited to 
the range of territorial laws." — 10 P6ters''s Report, page 611. 



lat did the Supreme Court do with that decision of theirs when they decided 
'red Scott case? Kevor said a word about it ; utterly disregarded it ; never 



What 
the Dr< 

even'expl.-sined it ; never qualified it at all. I hold in my hand the authorities, as 
collected in Burire's Commentaries on Colonial and Foreign Laws on the subject of 
the conflict of laws with regard to slavery. I will not read it at length, but here 
and there. I hold, first, that at common law, by which I mean the common law of 
England, slaves could not be htjden at all. They never were holden lawfull}' in 
England. When the qtiestion arose, it was at once so decided in Sommerseit's case. 
I know tliere had been an opinion given before that time, when a question arose in 
relation to their navigation act, whether, under the navig ition act, slaves were mcF- 
chandise. It was not decided by any suit, but an opinion being called for by th« 
privy council, an opinion was given tliat they were, and therefore, foreigners could 
not carry on the slave trade with the British colonies; they wanted it all them- 
selves. The board of trade with the King in council, had their negative on the 
colonial laws. They disagreed to them whenever the colonies attempted to pass 
laws against the slaVery carried there under the Assiento contract, which the gen- 
tleman (Mr. Bkv.tamin') well understands. It was a profitable business to the trade 
of England ; and whenever the colonies attempted to get rid of it, they immediately 
interfered. By the colonial charter, the King in council, had a negative on the 
acts of the colonial Legislature. Sometimes they were negatived in that way; 
sometimes acts were passed effecting the same end. In short, they forced the slave 
trade and the holding of slaves on the colonies by statute. By their power to 
regulate trade, they forced it upon the colonies when it was always against the com- 
mon law. Such was clearly the cause as laid down in the authorities as collected 
by Barge. They passed, from time to time, statutes to aid and encourage the trade, 
lie says : 

"Sir .John Hawkins was the first Englishman who, in 1.56'2, introduced the practice of buying or 
kidnapping negroes in Africa, and transporting and selling Ihem for slaves in the West Indies. In 
1C20, a Dutch vessel carried a cargo of slaves from Africa to Virginia." 

After that was the opinion under the navigation act. He says: 



21 

" The Legislature of Pennsylvania, wlic-n tbe British colony, paased, on the ITlh of Junf, 1712, Rti 
Eict to prevent the importation of ncaroi's and Indians into that province. It was disallowed bjr 
Great Britain, and accordingly repealed by an act of tiuoen Anne, on the 20th of February, 1713." 
♦ *«***•**•««**• 

"In 1765, the Governor of Jamaica informed tb.e Assembly of that island, that, consixtently with 
his instructions, he could not give his assent to a bill, which had then been read twice, for limiting 
the importation of slaves into that colony. In 1774, the Jamaica Assembly aUeuipted to prevent the 
further importation by an increase of duties tlicreon, and for this purpose passed two acts. The 
merchanls of Bristi>l and Liverpool jietitioned asaiust their allowance. The board of trade made a 
rejxirt aij.vinst them. The agent of Jamaica was heard against tliat report ; but upon the recommen- 
dation of the privy coimcil the acts were disallowed, and the disallowance was accompanied by an 
instruction to the Governor, dated the 2'?th of February. 1775, by which he was proiiibiled, 'upon 
pain of being removed from his povernmenl,' from giving his assent to any a^t by which the duties 
on the importation of slaves should be augmented." 

TJie same author declares: 

"Upon the disappearance of slavery in Europe, it commenced in America. The great Powers, 
Bngland, France, Holland, Spain, and Portugal, some of whom boa'.t'of the freedom of their insti- 
lotions, exerted all their energies and authority to introduce and maintain it in their colonies, by 
means of tlie African slave trade. Their resources were employed, and their subjects invited and 
encouraged to fill their colonies with slaves. We turn with disgust from the various expedients by 
triiich these Slates endeavored to secure to themselves the monopoly of this odious iraCfic, to the 
revenues which they derived from it, and to tlie remorseless perseverance with which England and 
France uniformly resisted every alterapt on tiie pan of their colonists to check its progress. 

"To the existence of slavery in their colonies, the parent States gave the fidlest and most .ictive 
encouragement. Under the eanction of their laws and the decisions of their courts, slaves became 
property. But whilst they eauctioned, encouraged, and rwcognized the legality of slavery in their 
•olocies, tliey denounced its existence in their possejsions in Europe." 

This wa? not peculiar to Englaiid, but extended to the other nations mentioned. 

Mf. BEXJAMIN'. Will the Senator peraiit me a moment ? I ask liim just there, 
■wh.ethcr the author cites anj- authority showing that tiie English Government dis- 
touraged slaverj- in Etiglaud at tlie time tliese colonies had it introduced among 
them — whether he cites a solitary authority or historian? 

Mr. COLLAMER. I will read: 

"There exists, then, a statia which is legal in the countries in which it is constituted, but illegal 
in another country to which the person may re.oort. 

'• In this conflict there has been a uniformity of opinion among jnrist3, and of decision by judicial 
tribunals, in giving no effect to the fitatue, however legal it may have been in the country in which 
the person was born, or iu which he was previously domiciled, if it be not recognized by the law of 
hi* actual domicile. 

"This principle was adopted by the supreme council of Mechlin as its established law. In 15.31 
it refused to issue a warrant to take up a person who had escaped from Spain, whi;re he had been 
botight and legally held in slavery." 

" Although the EdiU of April, 1615, and May, 1685. h.id recognized the tiUe to slaves and the !e' 
gality of slavery in the colonies of France) yet" within Uiat kingdom it was illegal." 

jMr. EENJAMIX. Tlie Senator perhaps does not understand the precise question 
I put to hirn. If I understand him aright, he says that tlat author declares that, 
although the English Government established slavery, and forced slavery on its colo- 
tiies on this continent, it discountenanced slavery at home, and slavery was not re-* 
cognized at home, 

ilr. COLLAMER. I did not say discountenanceil. 

Mr. BENJAMIN. Refused to acknowledge it. 

Mr. COLLAMER. Certainly. 

Sir. BKNJAillN. I ask for 'the authority for that 

Mr. COLLAMER. It is frequently the c!v?e in the world, that strength nnd power 
overcome right for the time being, until justice and the proper tribunals of justice 
are appealed to. TJiat proves nothing. It is when the competent authorities are 
appealed to and a decision is made, that we begin to ascertain what is the law of 
the country. As to what the gentleman asks me, now I will read to hitn further 
from the same volume : 

" In 1729, Sir P. York, then Attorney Gencr.il and Mr, Talbot, the Solicitor General of England) 
gave their opininn, lliat a slave, by coming from the West Indies, either with or without his master, 
to Great liritaiu or Ireland, did not become free ; and that his master's property or right in hina 
was not thereby determined or varied." 

That was not the decision of a court ; it was the opinion of the Attorney and So* 
licitor Gefieral. 

" This < pinion was acted on. Slaves who had arrive*! in England from the British colonies were 
bo'jght and sold publicly in the cities of London, Bristol, and Liverpool ; and in tlie year 1771, whert 
the negro Sommergetfs case wa» decided, it was said there wore at least fourteen thousand s!aT«s 
in Loudon," 



22 

That was withont law. Tliej' got there, as the author states, by virtue of the 
opinion expressed by Sir Philip York, who had no judicial power whatever: 

"The court of King's Bench in that case [Somersett] distinctly and expressly recognized the 
principle that the status of slavery ' was a municipal relation, an institution, therefore confined to 
certain places, and necessarily dropped by ])assage into a country where such municipal relation 
did not subsist. The negro, making choice of his habitation in England, had subjected himself to 
the penalties, and was therefore entitled to the protection of the laws.' 

" A few years afterwards the case of Knieht ts. Wedilerburn was brought before the court of 
session, in Scotland. The master claimed Knight as a slave, but the court adopted the principle 
that slavery was not recognized by the laws of that kingdom, and was inconsistent with the princi- 
ples thereof ; that the regulations in Jamaica concerning slaves did not e.\tend to that kingdom, and 
repelled the defender's claim to a perpetual service." 

In a more rece.nt case, i\Ir. Burge says: 

" It has lieen applied when the person has placed himself beyond the limits of the country in 
which the .statiin existed by law, and became subject to the law of mother country whose Institutions 
did not recognize that (status thougli he did not put his foot on her shores." 

That was where he went on board ship, and the ship carried him off. I also cite 
in the second Barnewall & Cresswell, decided b}* Chief Justice Best, where the whole 
subject is very fully examined, and where the same decision as in the ease of Som- 
mersett was made. I next cite not merely that case, but cases decided by the Su- 
preme Court of the United States. I have already alluded to Prigg vs. Pennsylvania. 
There is also the case of G-roves vs. Slaughter. That was a case from the State of 
Mississippi. jMississippi had forbidden the bringing of slaves there for sale ; but if 
they were personal prc^:iGrty, as the Supreme Court say in the Dred Scott case, the 
same as other personal property, the States could not regulate the trade in chattels 
of any kind between them. I take it, if slaves be property at all, they are personal 
property; for the Constitution says they are persons, and you say they are proper- 
ty. The Stales have no power to regulate trade between each other. The Supreme 
Court of the United States were appealed to on that subject, and it was insisted that 
the power was vested in Congress to regulate trade between the other States and 
the State of Mississippi, and that no State can forbid the sale of the property of 
another State within its territory. The Supreme Court, howevej-, sustained the 
right of Mississippi to do what slie did, clearly because slaves were not like other per- 
sonal property, 'ihe States, the court said, had the right to prohibit such sale. In a 
case in Kentucky, Rankin vs. Lj'dia, in second Marshall, the woids of the court are: 

"We view this (slavery) as a right existing by positive law, of a municipal character, withoui 
foundation in the law o{ nature, or in the unwritten common law." 

I do not wish to elaborate this point any more. 

Mr. MALLOP1.Y. Will my friend from. Vermont permit me to draw his attention 
to a single point? I perceive that he has quoted from the Sommersett case, and it 
has been referred to a great deal on the other side of tlie Chamber. I have not a 
very distinct recollection of it, but I will ask him whether, in that case, wliich 13 
regarded here as a leading one, the sole question before the court of King's Benck 
was not !is to the right of any man to take another one out of the realm of England 
v>'itiiout his authority or the authority of law; and whether the principle that a 
slave brought from the West Indies ceased t-o be a slave because he was brought to 
England was mooted there at all? 

Mr. COLLAMEE. TJie gentleman seems to have put together in his mind the case 
of the slave Grace, which was before Lord Stowell, and tlie Somersett ease, that was 
before Lord Mansfield. The Somersett case was clear and distinct enough. The fact 
was, if the slave was tlie man's property, he had a right to take him. So the Supreme 
Court deci'led in the Prigg case, no distinction of that kind can be made. He had a 
right to take him away if he was property, but the court, in Somersett's case, held 
he was free in England. It is true that, in the case of the slave Grace, before Lord 
Stowell, a question arose as to what would be the effect of returning voluntarily into 
the master's service in the State where the service was due, after the slave had been 
brought out, and h,ad been in England or France. Lord Stowell said that, if the 
servant Grace returned witli her master, voluntarily, to her former status, she would 
be a slave still in Jamaica. I think that was tlie decision. That has been quite a 
mooted question here. Our Supreme Court, I believe, decided that in the Kentucky 
case of Graham vs. Strader; and if the Supreme Court, in the Dred Soott case, had 
simply confined itself to the fact that Dred Scott, wherever he was, voluntarily went 
back with his master to Missouri, and thereby returned to his former status, no man 
■would ever have made a word about the decision at all. 

There is another nice distinction about that made by Lord Stowell, and made, also, 



23 

in a case in Pickering, in Maasacbusetts ; and that is, as to whether tlie State or coun- 
try into whicli the man goes, forbids slavery absolutely, or -whether it only forbids 
the master from using power, as a master, over him there. If it is the latter, and he 
volunl,arily returns, he waives that; but, if it is the former, and the slavery is de- 
clared absolutely void and ended, then the return would not affect it. That is, how- 
ever, a nice distinction, which it is not necessary now to make. 

The next point in the syllogism is, that slaves, being property like any other 
property, their owners have a right to go to the Territories with them. What is 
that founded on? I have no doubt that slaves are not propert}', though, perhaps, 
they may be called such where slavery is authorized by law; but even if they were, 
how does this follow? What is the reason that the slaveholder has a right to take 
his slave there ? You say the territory which we have acquired belongs to the peo- 
ple of the several States. That is notVue. It belongs to the people of the United 
States. If it belongs to the people of the several States, each several State would 
have its right to a proportion of it; and if it was sold by the General Government, 
they would have a right to their proportion of the money. Clearly so, if the Gen- 
eral Government holds it as a mere trustee for the States, as cestui que trusts. Now, 
how idle is tliat. Here you hear one day that we own the territory, and that every 
man has a right to go there with his property, because each man has his share in the 
land ; and the next^day we admit it as a free State, and there is not a quarter of the 
land sold. Now, according to this doctrine, the people of the slaveholding States 
have lost all their land there. It is a most palpable inconsistencj'. The assumption 
that the several States have an interest in the land there, is not true. The whole 
theory oi it is founded on a wrong doctrine. 

In the next place, it is said that^ inasmuch as slaves are property, and recognized 
as property by the Constitution of the United States, (which argument I have al- 
ready answered,) if we do not allow the owners to go there with them, it is an in- 
fringement of their rights, and a breach of the fifth section of the amendments of 
the "Constitution, which declares that no man shall be deprived of life, liberty, or 
property, without due process of law. It is a curious fact, that the extremes of this 
([Tiestion seem to meet on this common ground. One man says we cannot permit 
slaves to exists in a Territory' at all Why? Because, he says, we cannot depi'ive 
any man of his life, liberty, or property, without due process of law. Now, if you 
permit slaves to be holden iu a Territory, you deprive a man of his liberty. I say 
you do not. I do not understand that when they allowed slavery to continue to 
exist iu Louisiana, they deprived any man on earth of his liberty. It was gone be- 
fore. So, too, when they allowed slaves to be taken, as they did, into Mississippi 
from Georgia, did they deprive any man of his liberty? No; he was deprived of 
it before. So the opposite extreme of the question cite not only the Constitution to 
support their doctrine, that you cannot prohibit slavery in the Territoi'i(is, but cite 
the very same words. They say you cannot prohibit it, because it will deprive the 
owner of his property. The others say you cannot allow it, because it will deprive 
so'Toebody of his liberty. 

The fact is, neither is well founded. When the Missouri compromise line was 
made, there was not a white inhabitant, or black inhabitant, in all the vast uninhab- 
ited region, north of that line — not a settler in it. When the line was run, and it was 
provided that no slavery should be atlmitted north of it, I want to know if there was 
a slaveholder in the United States that parted with any of his slaves? Was there a 
slaveholder in the United States whose slaves were confiscated? Was there a slave- 
holder in the United States whose slaves were set free? How, then, can you say 
that the adoption of the Missouri compromise line confiscated any one's property ; 
or, in other words, deprived a man of liis property without due process of law? It 
did not deprive any man of his proi>erty at all, with or without process of law. 
You have laws in your own States — Virginia has^ouo, and, I think, Maryland; most 
of the slave States — againsi bringing in blacks, and especially slaves, for sale; they 
forbid it. Does that confiscate any of the property of the slaveholders of Maryland, 
or of any other State? Not at alL Does it deprive any man of his property ? Cer- 
tainly not at all. 

I have stated all there is in the Dred Scott decision. The only reason given in 
the world, the only one suggested, why Congress cannot forbid the taking of slaves 
into the Territories, is because it would infringe that article of the Constitution, and 
deprive some man of his property without due process of law. It is a mere assump- 
tion, totally unfounded; for, when the act was made, it did not deprive any man 
of his property, and could not, and never could. 



Mr. Presitletit, when vvs consider that this court have 'utterly disregarded thoir 
otvn decisions, have made assumptions on which they have founded their opinions, 
which are thus utter!}' inconsistent; when we examine this decision in the light any 
of us possess, I say it is not entitled to respect, even as a precedent; and further, 
in all this there is no intention to break down the Supreme Court. They have dis- 
regarded their own decisions in making this. I take it they will disregard this when 
they eonie to make another. Thev have certainly the power of revision. 

And now, Mr. President, I will tring my remai'ks to a termination^ The whole 
question is, in effect: shall we restore the compromise line by excluding slavery 
from the territories ? Is not that peace? Was it not peace while it existed ? Is not 
this the olive branch? Is it not the harbinger of repose ? Is it wrong? Is it out- , ^ 
rageous ' Is it any violence f It is simply to bring back things to where they were ; M 
and all I can now say is, that if tlie Ilepublican party is true to its purposes, and " 
can effect them, it will effect that peace, even to the South — for I do not believe 
they ever aViied for that repeal, or ever wanted iL I believe it was altogether tho 
exertion -of politicians and a scramble for the Presidency. If anybody, b}' that re- 
peal and that Kansas Nebraska bill, shall ever get to be President by virtue of it, 
and succeed in the purposes for which it was entered upon, 1 am inclined to think 
that so far from being a cure, it will only add another evil to come out of this box of 
Pandora, 



